


Shoes

by PensiveShadows



Category: Zombies Run!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-15
Updated: 2012-08-15
Packaged: 2017-11-12 04:37:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/486766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PensiveShadows/pseuds/PensiveShadows
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She hadn't had to pay for the shoes...</p>
<p>Runner Five, before and during the end of the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shoes

She hadn't had to pay for the shoes, her mom had bought them when she was down on her luck. She liked them for the way her feet pushed just the perfect amount into the cushion, and the way they held her close when the laces were snug. 

Three weeks later, when the winds blew bitter cold and the world began to end, the shoes turned from a simple gift to something precious. Her mother went to church to pray while her father taught her how to shoot a gun. Later on the news, they learned someone had drank from the communion wine while infected. The priest had barred the doors to the sanctuary and the congregation was lost. Her mother didn't come home that night, and the incident became known as the Our Lady massacre, before the infrastructure failed and they couldn't get news anymore. She went to sleep that night with the shoes clutched to her chest, fingers tangled in the laces. 

That next week, the precious shoes became useful. Her father packed her backpack full of food, ammo and supplies, and sent her out to try to reach Mullins. He knew he wouldn't make it there with his bad knee. Most of their neighborhood had fallen, and her father was unofficially commanding the survivors. He settled the strap of the gun across her chest, and gave her a rough hug goodbye. 

The shoes saved her life that week. She knew how to travel to avoid the worst of the mobs of walking dead, but her progress was slow, trying to find a path while civilization burned around her. More than once, she found herself running for her life, trying to avoid a zombie that surprised her. 

Her food ran out later that month. She had been carefully rationing her supplies, but she found herself down to the bag of peppermints that had been stuffed in a side pocket. The shoes kept her going then, cradling her feet, pushing her forward. 

She wouldn't let them take her shoes when she staggered through the gates at Mullins. Shivering, bone-thin, with haunted eyes, she hunched around her shoes, clinging to them when they made her strip to check for infection. 

When Mullins made her part of the military, they tried to issue her new shoes. All she would accept were laces, replacing the ones that were worn and frayed so that the shoes would hug her feet tight once more. Her old laces, she braided into a bracelet, and wore on her left wrist. She didn't want to give anything up of the precious shoes. 

She checked her laces before she stepped into the copter to go to Abel, pulling them snug and double knotting them. When the pilot shouted that they were going down, she fingered her bracelet and braced for the impact. 

The shoes hit the dirt as she stumbled blindly away from the crash. The headset crackled and she heard a warm male voice, only slightly panicked, telling her that the precious shoes would save her once more. She ran.


End file.
